11/52

Or, Mother's Day 2016.

Steve has no great tradition of Mother's Day observance. A phone call or text message, perhaps. In my family, I usually send my mum a card and gift in the "box of chocolates" ballpark. Following our pregnancy losses, it became one of those things that repelled me and I would just try and order the chocolates while mentally holding my breath.

For my first Mother's Day as a mother, I'd be lying if I said it didn't mean anything to me but I didn't want to make a Big (and aggressively pink) Thing out of it.



So here's Mother's Day. Bed. Pyjamas. Packet of biscuits. Card "to the loveliest mum in the wide world". And my baby, rapidly morphing into my little boy, comfortable and happy in my lap and looking at me as if I am indeed the loveliest mum in the whole wide world.

I'll take it. :)

Loop

Problem: In pain.
Solution: Take painkillers.

Problem: Cannot take painkillers on empty stomach.
Solution: Eat something.

Problem: Cannot prepare meal, even microwave meal, while in this kind of pain.
Solution: Eat something small that does not require preparation - a couple of biscuits, a bag of crisps, a slice of bread.

Problem: That is not a balanced diet, and if you don't eat the 'proper' food in the fridge, it will go off and you will be wasting money and killing the planet and what about the Starving Children In Africa.
Solution: Eat 'proper' meals as well, including meat/protein, fruit/vegetables, dairy products, and rice/pasta/potatoes.

Problem: Eating more calories than I burn. Cannot afford to buy whole new wardrobe.
Solution: Cut out snacking between meals.

Problem: Cannot take painkillers on empty stomach.

It annoys me that after six years I still get stuck in this loop on such a regular basis.

Biscuits

When I started work, okay, I was on minimum wage, but I had something that Steve and his high-flying techie friends didn't have. An office kitchen with a "help yourself" policy. While none of the people with 'proper' jobs were really about to take an 80% pay cut and relinquish their daytime internet access just for free tea, coffee, and biscuits, it did make me feel a little bit better. I had a Perk. I didn't have to drink hot coloured water from a plastic cup and pretend it was tea, and I never had to thump a vending machine which had eaten my last twenty pence piece but not dispensed my goodies. No tokens, no cards, no forms, no systems, no unspoken implication that given half a chance the employees would undermine the entire company with our gluttony... just a decent cuppa and a biscuit whenever I felt I wanted one. It must not be underrated.

Then the unthinkable happened. A couple of people went on diets, and the person who had been the most influential in keeping the biscuit cupboard stocked left for another job. I would go to the cupboard and find no biscuits - or worse, I would find half a packet of Custard Creams, which I detest. For the last few months, I've been taking my own snack in my handbag, which isn't a problem, but I did miss my mid-afternoon Perk of biscuitty goodness.

But yesterday! I don't know what compelled me to look in the cupboard, but I did, and lo, there was half a packet of Custard Creams, and... a pristine, unopened packed of chocolate digestives. Dark chocolate digestives. My favourite.

Could be it's the drugs talking - I am having a bit of a time of it and taking more than I otherwise would this week - but that packet of biscuits filled my heart with joy. I suddenly felt a lot more positive about all sorts of things.